Ep.148 w/PWCC's Jesse Craig

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<span;>Episode of this Force Kardasian podcast, the show that brings you all the important hobby news discussions debates. Opinions info and interviews with key Hobby and sports dignitaries. Also, if you're good, you know, we are going to give away something. Now. Here's the guy that one of the cards more than the gum, John Newman. All right, welcome to episode 148. As you may know, sometimes I do bring some of my outside. Personal life on to the show. If you're an average listener of the program, you may know as I shared that the first week or very early September. I lost my job that I was at six years in the transportation industry. Mentioned that you know, last couple years wasn't real fond of it was kind of exploring, you know, new employment just the same.

<span;>When it happens, you know, it's not a fun situation, but wanted to get into the teaching industry have a lot of friends who are teachers have a few other friends that are teachers assistant and they assistance. And they always were telling me I should do that. You know, no one, I coached Varsity Sports and of Coach Youth Sports and no one kids are an important part of, you know what I do and Believe in. And so I went and took that teacher's assistant test scored a 285 out of a possible. 300 300 is the high 285 is what I scored, you needed a 220 to get a certificate. So I obviously got my test certificate and a plan went to an open house, actually, very close to where I live for about four teachers assistance.

<span;>And, you know, had to actually two interviews on the same day. One one person, and then they wanted me to speak with someone else. Like my background, about the interview went well. So at the time of this recording, I'm in the process and next thing I got to do is get fingerprinted and then I've verbally accepted a teaching assistant position with the school high school.

<span;>I won't say which one? To keep that sort of private, but got to get fingerprinted and then have to be approved at a Board of Education meeting. I'm told that's more of a formality than anything else and I'll be starting maybe as early as next week, at my new position as a teacher assistant and have Summers off and New Direction. And I think it's going to be more rewarding to work with Youth, including some special needs of student. It's going to be something that I know. I'm going to really get a lot from it and it's going to be a breath of fresh air compared to, you know, what I did, you know, the last six years and I'm looking forward to the challenge and look forward to working with the younger set and making, you know, making an impact on the younger.

<span;>Person's life. So one of the share that very excited for that update. It. It's a, we get to that, that start date or personal thing, and they did sharing this, but then I thought, well, you know, it's about my dad and but he's been on the show. He's been on dr. Beckett show. Actually two episodes, even though it was one recording, and some people have gotten to know him through those listening. To him on those those episodes. One of the nicest guys, you could ever meet few days ago before this recording, be called me up. He was diagnosed with covid place in three bands. One of his band members got diagnosed with it and told the rest of the band, yet. They should get tested. And so, my dad went to get a covid test, then the doctor called him.

<span;>Two days later to tell them. It was positive. His only symptoms were minor cold, runny nose, no cough, or congestion. Thank God. And got a quarantine for 14 days and then get retested what he's doing. Well, he's 83 years old raring to go still and you know, very fortunate. We are that his symptoms are on the minor scale. We all know what this dreaded. Virus is capable of, but he got both his shots and probably could thing. And maybe that's a direct reason why he's not more affected. And thankfully, he's not, he's anxious to get back behind the drum kit and play. We were not at 83 years old. He's been a drummer since he's a teenager, but what he's in three bands, no, you didn't mishear me three bands at age 83 and

<span;>Couple gigs a week, but had to take a break from those while we quarantines. But the prognosis is good. Just wanted to share that being that he's been on the show and dr. Beckett, the show as well. So he's doing all right, actually just spoke to him before I recorded this intro as well. Just check up on and it's in good spirits other than a little bit of cabin fever and so should be Be okay, not that guy. So enough about enough about me and my dad, let's talk about today's show. You know, I've always said on this show. There are two sides to every story I believe in equal time if I'm on the show and you know, mentioning things that are being reported or allegedly happening. I've always said, did you know that person or that organization is always well.

<span;>The Mind long as they're willing to talk about. Well, Jesse Craig Director of Business Development at PWC. See is today's guest. Yes. We are going to talk about some of the many things that I've talked about involving PWC see on the show. Now, the whole interview is not going to be that. I don't think that's fair either. We're going to talk about current events with PWC. See other than An some of the negative ones we You hear about and you know, he agreed to come on. I told him I'm going to ask you questions about some of these alleged indiscretions and he said that that's fine. And I won't say any more about the interview. Other than that, you can listen for yourself, whatever feedback you want to give me pertaining to that interview my door as always for any interview or any thing pertaining to the show. Is open and, you know, I'm glad Jesse came on. I'm not going to say, you know, after the interview, my mind's necessarily changed or whatnot, but I'm glad he was, you know, forthcoming and you know didn't give me a script or anything like that. I don't operate on those terms anyway, so, you know, let me know what you think, you know. Also if we've ever talked about your you

<span;>Your organization or a lie alleged allegations and you would like to come on this program to, you know, talk about it or explain your side of things. My door is always open. I think that's just the fair thing to do. All right, that being said, let's get the show started.

<span;>All right. Time for our new product release schedule announcement and I'm glad to say you won't be hearing me do it this week. We got the awesome Max culture from the sports card shop at Moco. He's done it before. He's a grizzled veteran. He's back to help us out again. Let's go hand it over to Max. Take it away, sir. Welcome to the sports Carnation pod.

<span;>Here, we are back with our releases is Max gotcher. I will be announcing their leases for you guys today. Okay? On the 8th of October. We started off with 2021, Onyx vintage backs, Pascal on the 8th of October as well. We also have 2021 wildcard map football Mega. I'm really luck coming to like those Wild Card boxes are really nice looking all. It's on the 8th. We have Pokemon celebrations. Elite Trainer boxes on the 13th. We have tops update Series baseball and interesting product that you see some new players come up there. Likes on their new rookie cards.

<span;>Look, honey. Donna's optic basketball fast breaks are on the 13th as well. That will be an interesting one after this year. There's a nice design. I like some of the parallels this year. They did a good job. Also the 13th. We have women. I'm Star Trek are in images by Rittenhouse. So nice product as well. Another 13th release. We have Marvel annual trading cards. Those Marvel cards are becoming really popular recently. And on the 15th. We have Leaf, Ultimate Sports also on the 15th. We have Panini Domino's, Futbol factory set.

<span;>And on the 15th again, we have Tony down this optic Choice, baseball, that's going to be a cool product. Another 15 threes release. We have Panini Origins football, International blasters. And the last release on the 15th is 2021 tops. WWE Chrome. Those WWE cards are pretty cool. Thank you again John for having me and enjoy the pot, the rest of the podcast. This sports card shot is your small town local card, shop with a global reach located in New Buffalo MI, Michigan. The shop is one of the most accessible in the midwest. In addition to being an authorized Panini direct dealer, the sports card shop, carries all major trading card Brands, including Tops Upper Deck, Pokemon Yu-Gi-Oh, and more with all that new wax, a half million singles and showcases full of grated cards. You're sure to find Something great for your collection. Whether you're just Starting out or a seasoned collector. The sports card shop. Is your One-Stop shop. So call us. Come see us or visit us on the web and social media. Our phone number is two six nine four, six nine zero, one four. Zero website is the sports card shop at Mo co.com. The sports card shop is part of the Moko, Retail Group connecting Sports The Hobby and people around the world. It's time for the hobby. What's up, where we go around the Hobby World and tell you all the latest news and breaking stories from the hobby. We love.

<span;>Alright, so you did and won't hear Jesse Craig and it didn't come up during this interview. The just been 224 million dollar civil class action lawsuit. Has been filed against them pertaining to the show. Bidding allegations wasn't talked about on the show today, because it's an ongoing litigation actually very early stages. And if you know anything about legalese, you can't discuss. Kind of current cases, like that beforehand. So that's not anything. We're dodging or ducking questions. It's just pretty fresh brand-new, and you can't just can't discuss those things. Things. And so you won't hear that, but that lawsuit has been filed. What is a class class action civil lawsuit? Well, if you think you were affected by, you've purchased the card from the PWC, see platform and believe that show busy. Affected you and your purchase. You can add your name to that lawsuit, don't believe there's any fees for that if there's either an out-of-court settlement.

<span;>10:22 PM
<span;>Linkedin's plaintiffs behalf being the people not PWC. See, you will be awarded. Some form of compensation to be determined with. There's no guarantee with these. A lot of these don't even make it to trial. Sometimes they are dismissed. Sometimes they're settled out of court. So, very early stages, but I wanted to allude to that. It's making the news, but why we? In touch on it during the interview itself, some tap snooze, you know, they're going on with business as usual. They just released their second series of nft s based on their you know in hand product, but these are n FTS and they just announced. They got the exclusive rights to nip on professional League a Japanese 12T.

<span;>Lee obviously in Japan, the first time in their 80-year history, they're producing japanese cards for the entire league. It will happen very quickly. You're going to see cards here, probably as early as three, four weeks. All my Intel is showing that they're going to be sold on Japanese platforms, but, like, everything else in the world, right? The world is a small place with social media in the The interwebs that Al Gore apparently created or invented. But if you do want these Japanese leek cards and upon Li cards even here in the states. I'm sure it will be available on a lot of these secondary platforms and social media selling sites and the like. And again, I'm not even saying tops doesn't make it available Stateside. I just everything I saw show, Jeff.

<span;>These web sites and platforms, but you never know. And who knows? Maybe we'll see him Montgomery. 582 online, exclusive members exclusive pertaining to the nip on Japanese league. So stay tuned for that. A busy month for PSA grading in September. They, graded 830,000 cards, reportedly the most ever they've graded. In a 30-day span that does not mean those were all subbed and business is booming again. I'm sure they're doing okay, but these are all cards that mostly they had in their possession. I'm sure there were some Express cards in there as well full, you know, disclosure there, but they are trying to catch up on their back lat speaking of tops and

<span;>That's a good segue into Michael Rubin. The CEO Fanatics was on Squawk Box last week. And obviously the Acquisitions of the licenses came up and what their plans are. We, you know, up until now we've sort of heard rumors and innuendo. This was his first publicly attributed comments by him directly and he reiterated what we kind of heard that you know for now. Maddox wants to be kind of the One-Stop shop from production to grading to evolve to a Marketplace direct to Consumer and the even alluded to what a lot of people have been speculating on that. The the quote, most likely quote, most likely will be purchasing a existing card. Brand did not mention any random.

<span;>Her name's just was said, most likely. So read into that. What you will, but there it is. Now right from the horse's mouth as they say. So stay tuned. Again. This is this is going to be a story that just keeps gaining Traction in the years to come until they actually have to produce something. The industry Summit held in Vegas announced Movie. Not for I guess they're going to stay in Vegas, but the event will now take place at Harris and the card show will be returning. The card show will be September 30th to October first two days. And then the summit will be the second to the 5th of October. October 2nd to October 5th and Harris. They just completed a 200 million dollar renovation. Ian and in other day, secured some rooms at Caesar's Palace directly across the street. So more space. So it looks like the industry Summit. May be getting preparing to get a little bit larger in scope, probably in attendees and vendors and I've never been, I do plan on going at some point, but I heard it's a great event kind of living vicariously. Others who have attended. So there's your hobby news, not a slow week by any means and we'll see what will continue to happen. Hobby is Ever Changing. Hey, everybody, if you want about collectible, it's the one stop shop, where any collector can buy and trade affordable shares in some of the most rare and valuable sports cards and memorabilia in the world, starting from just five dollars from 1950 to Vicky man. So PSA Tenzin Wilt Chamberlain's iconic, rookie uniform to 1 of 1, Patrick homes rpas, where LeBron James logo, Manson everything in between Collectibles, creating never-before-seen, access and opportunities for investing in the hobby. Just download the app and sign up with the referral code scn, to get your first share free, please note. This is not a recommendation or solicitation to buy any security. All investment decisions should be undertaken after doing your own research. You want answers?

<span;>Alright, another question on this segment that came from multiple folks, not just one person. So I can't give necessarily one person credit for asking it but just a few people have required, you know, tops. If you're Montgomery Club, 582 member, you know, you get those exclusive offers. Well, three or four people have reached out that are also in it like myself and basically, Ask me to kind of paraphrase this and, you know, putting all the questions kind of into one question. You know, how I've noticed price has kind of gone up from what they're traditionally would be at. And they're starting to, you know, shipping you some be free with smart bows. And now it's, you know, usually 10 to $15 minimum. They asked number one have a notice that number two. Am I still buying everything that's offered to me as a Montgomery? 85-82 member, couple of those folks have said they bypassed some things, including other recent Bowman X, which is not Bowman X Chrome, which is not great as like it used to be. It's an encased card. The Hefty price tag one card $175. I would not argue the logic, you know, whether that's a good deal. You know it when

<span;>Add the bass years, releases, its not. And, But to answer your question. I have noticed and I have bought every Montgomery Club offering exclusive offering that I've logged on and we'll still available. I'm trying to take a heaven declined. Anything one of the reasons. Why is I really don't open any of that or very rare, you know, less I get like multiple boxes and lately. IE the Montgomery Club offerings have been sort of a one box offer and there's exceptions to that. Major league soccer. Sapphire was three boxes, which I did by the three boxes. I don't have them in hand yet, but one of the reasons I'm buying them is because they generally resell for higher amounts and then usually the longer, you hold them, the higher that prices again nothing's guaranteed in life, but that

<span;>Generally been the But obviously, as they raise those exclusive price offerings that that ceiling is is lower. Right? I get it and I don't blame anyone for not you know, purchasing or declining. I get, I understand fully why I haven't done that. My kind of theory and that's all, you know, my kind of gut feeling is as worst case scenario. I should be able to sell that item that box that says Whatever the offering is, you know, at least pretty close to what I paid for. Even if it's a little less, it shouldn't be a tremendous amount less. So it's really hate to say like this and Jake's anything, but it's really almost can't lose. But I also fully understand why, you know, and I'll just use Bowman Chrome acts as an example. You don't want to pay $175 for 1 card. I get it. Definitely not going to be something I open that's going to be something.

<span;>Keep see your whether I sell it right away or later on or or what not. I don't know, but I haven't declined anything yet. As of this recording, my intent is not to. But again, you know, depending on how high these exclusive offering prices go, you know, why someone else asked me to kind of putting all these questions into addressing, this, as one big question. Someone asked me. Why do you I think they're probably Prices have went up. I think it's probably an obvious answer, right, you know, they're not going to be able to do some of these offerings here, most likely in a couple years and I think they're going to strike while the Iron's hot. Right? Let's, let's be honest, you know, you know, the other question to Will Montgomery Club 582. Go away when they lose their license, maybe not. But they're gonna probably either offer retired player.

<span;>Exclusives, right, your man knows now that he's back in the fold Jeter, maybe some things along those lines. Obviously, they still have the soccer license. So you might see, you're still see all those soccer offerings. You know, I've got another great question is when they lose some of these license. And you know, well people still sign up for the Montgomery Club offering, I think they'll be the last.

<span;>Truth be told to ask myself that question. I guess it depends on what that club membership price goes to, you know, it does it stay the same. Does it go up? If it probably goes up and probably be something I think about, we're not having some current baseball players. In those products, probably might have to step down or not do it, but, you know, Somebody say even if it stays the same John, you're not gonna devalue might not be there. I guess it's one of those when the time, you know, the old saying right? Cross that bridge, when we come to it. So my intent is to try to stay a member of the Montgomery 582 Club as long as they do it, but again, you got to do it when it makes sense. If it starts to not make sense then, you know, unfortunately, I have a decision to make and losing no.

<span;>Stowe's licensing here, in a few years is definitely a lobbyist Game Changer, not just in their regular Flagship Brands, but even some of these exclusive Club offerings, and so it's going to be, you know, too early to really die too deep into that. But those are just some of the questions. I've sort of get on almost every week basis. I wanted to kind of wrap it all up into one. So I hope that answers some of

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<span;>That's, All right, joining me now on these ports, Carnation guess, light. Mr. Jesse Craig. He is the Director of Business Development at PWC. See, first off, welcome. Thanks for having me. John, appreciate it. Full disclosure. I know I do. Talk to you briefly briefly before we really went recording here. You know, I've been critical, you know of allegations that allegedly we got to use that word involving PWC. See, you know, if first came to light, you know, you joined the company 2018. Some of these were you know, allegations were pre you first we heard or I heard a woman and man, it was 2016. We all know about the blowout forms detective agency. I think that's, you know, can be good. It could be bad, you know, some of the allegations then were with show bidding. There were some emails brought to light, you know, we could we could debate the authenticity of them with Brett, supposedly the sender of, then some doctor cards that were knowingly or allegedly know when Lee,

<span;>Soul. I remember going to the 2019 National, you know, to say it didn't affect what was going on there. You know, I kind of, you know, that was people posted pictures and in the like, and whatnot. There's two side. I was always raised Jesse. There's two sides to every story, you know, you know, that we have recently, the whole eBay, everyone kind of, you know, went off to go into my new details. He bury versus PWC. See if you want to, you know, if I want a coin it like that. Again, she'll bidding sort of the accusation, you know.

<span;>You know, I've been critical. I've always said if this is, if this is true, you know, it's not good. I hope there's penalties repercussions, whatever those are not judge jury and executioner. It's not for me to determine what those are but I've been in this hobby. I'm an old guy. So I've been in this hobby, 38 years. I like to believe I'd I've done everything above board even as a seller myself and you know, listen things are going to

<span;>Ben, I'm not needed here. I think most people are at, so I've kind of rambled on just awful. You know what I said, I'll give you a chance to respond before you do, and I appreciate your coming out. I've always said on my show, you know, if I can, if I can say, say things, if someone went on their show, what's that? John did this or John? Did that? It wasn't true. I love, you know, I like the opportunity to address those things. Whatever they may be, so sure. Well, thanks for having me on John. I do appreciate it. You know, the whole eBay thing. I think the most frustrating thing for us is the fact that we have tried to do so much as a company and I know firsthand being here, you know, I can't speak a lot to things that happen before I came at the company. But since I've been here, I know for a fact that we have done a ton to try to get eBay to change their own policies, their own procedures to clean up, you know, what is what people do call, she'll bidding which

<span;>You know, the majority of time it's really Market manipulation. You know, I think they should the word sheol bidding and Market manipulation kind of get coupled in together. But I know for a fact that we've done a ton with them to try and combat that have them block IP addresses, for people don't pay, you know, remove bitter attractions and those kind of things are they finally did? And we have five years of emails, of eBay of us trying to get them to stop doing that. So a lot of buyer verification, a lot of shielding, these are things that we didn't.

<span;>The rate we don't tolerate. So the frustrating thing with eBay is when they made the claims they did, you know, we wanted to see the evidence in the proof that employees or you know, like they said Associates whoever that may be whether those are sellers of ours or employees or contractors. We wanted to see who it was and how it happened. And to this day we still have received nothing from eBay. All right, that you know why? So, might I guess my follow-up question to that. Jesse would be why, what, what benefit would they have to do that? I mean, you're obviously a huge seller, a huge force in the industry. That stuff's not deniable. That's just being honest about it. What what, you know, what angle would, you know, why would they do that? I guess, you're assuming that isn't true. Right? Well, I mean, you leave us with the same question. We don't, we don't know. Now, everyone's left to speculate, right? So we're speculating. On what it could be is it that they saw the writing on the wall from a competition perspective. I don't know. That could be it, you know, the premier option have been doing very well. But even before we built the premier optional we got their blessing to do it. So we're left a little perplexed perplexed and confused as well. Just to be honest with you. We don't really know. Okay. The other thing I've said on this very show, when that news broke, I said, if I'm PWC, see, and this is bullcrap of the tone it down a little

<span;>Fit. I'm contacting my, our lawyers, you know, he's speaking as you guys and, you know, whether it's defamation, libel, slander, whatever it qualifies for, I want to, you know, intern respond. If someone even even as an individual, just as nuts as a dealer podcast or whatever. If someone says something to that level kind of, you know, Bruce Fortune by reputation, Station or trying to I'm, you know, I'm going to defend it to this to up the ends that I'm able to. Obviously you're a bigger course, you know, Force than I am. Why not do that to say. Hey, this is not true. And we're going to go to the mat, the prove that it's not true. Yeah. See, lawsuits. Are there tricky game, you know, going up against a beast. That is eBay, to be honest with you. So we're

<span;>Really we're vetting with our lawyers on the the appropriate action that we need to take, but trust me. We don't we don't take it lightly. We completely deny anything. They said and like I mentioned before you show us the proof, shows us what it is, you know, it's frustrating for us that we've had the relationship we've had with eBay for so long and all of a sudden, you know, they can't even come talk to us behind closed doors that something is going on. You need to address this and we didn't get that from them whatsoever. So it felt emotional, but we don't know why they Did what they did still to this day, so you got crickets from nothing? Nothing. Yeah, well phone, call any kind of documentation. We, we did, we did learn that this was coming. We didn't know they were going to send out an email to everybody, but we learned that it was coming less than 24 hours before before that email went out. So we had a little bit of a heads up. But I mean that's that was it and since that announcement, or whatever would have press release that they put out, you've heard.

<span;>No, no correspondence, now nothing from them. So, and we've asked so, you know, we're forced to put our head down and start building, obviously our entire business. A lot of our operations are counting. Everything was wrapped up around eBay and you know, a third party software. So it was scary for us, you know, honestly, you know, the day after that happened, you know, we had to look internally and figure out what we were going to do and it went from being scared to being excited. That Well, now all these things. We have beating our head against the wall with four years with eBay, trying to get them to change things into their, you know, to their defense as much as I don't want to defend them, you know, being a being a big company with, you know, that much code and that much old code. It's not easy to change things. So, you know, things that we wanted to get done with them. And have them change things that just always was extremely difficult. And now that we're on our own platform, we control everything. So we get to build everything from scratch and that it and control everything, and that's what we're really excited about.

<span;>Yeah, just just to kind of kind of wrap it up, even going nut, the eBay thing, but the previous allegations with dr. Karch trim cards knowingly. Now. I know PWC, see that the people that were involved in that were banned. I mean to, you know, but there are people that will say, well, you can ban them afterwards but you you know, you kind of knew what was going on and when I say you, I'm not saying sure.

<span;>Just the company as a whole. Yeah, you got rid of them, kind of, you know, you got caught and then you ban them but that it was not only going on. I guess what, my question to you is, you know, to answer that. And with that being said, again, I'll let you should address that have you done every other heavy enacted, any new policies internally to because of allegations to ensure that these don't keep popping up. Up, you know continuously obviously I don't think anyone in the hobby like some of my milk. I'm sure you don't especially saying that the they're not accurate. So sort of a two-part question to those saying that it was a knowing thing. And have you have you have you enacted any kind of policies to for the future to sort of eliminate this before it becomes an issue. Yeah, I think, you know, our industry as a whole

<span;>Kind of the Wild Wild West leading up to a few years ago. To be honest with you. I think there was a lot of a lot of stuff that just got swept under the rug and, you know, whether it's one auction house or another, everybody dealt, you know, sold stuff at one place or the other and, you know, as a company, we always try to police cards and not people. We felt like that was a more appropriate thing to do because you don't know, you know, what's been done to a card. We're not a third-party Grading Company. We have, you know, we don't have any idea. So, you know, a Accusations are one thing but proof is another and you know, what? The forms did, that was really good as these before. And after pictures, they really showed that proof that you need to prove whether card had been altered or not. So, you know, I don't think they went about doing it in the right way with a lot of personal attacks for people. I think that's a little bit over the line, just personally, but but what they did is they help really clean the industry up. So kudos to them for that and I think we're where we're at today because of it, you know, I think that if that, if that didn't happen back in 2018.

<span;>10:47 PM
<span;>The word is today. I think that it takes Confidence from an investor standpoint and The Collector standpoint that what they're buying is legit and authentic and not altered and you know, the work that they did really helped that. So so for that, we're thankful that that it did happen as a company. We have our Marketplace guarantee our Marketplace tenants, you know, we have cards, we had nothing to do with, we have refunded and taking care of so many buyers of ours and its cost. Us a lot to do that, but we felt like it was right for the market to gain that confidence back with with all the buyers out there. And so as far as I know, we're the only auction house in the entire industry that has a Marketplace guarantee in a buyback guarantee. Okay. I'm not gonna you know, I again I appreciate you coming on and being transparent, you know, just for those listening to this. I really wasn't given. Hey, don't ask this, don't ask that.

<span;>During his interview again. I don't want this interview to be just that, that's not how I operate, you know, regardless of what whoever believes one thing is true is PwC, see is a huge Force right now in the industry. I want to get into that for sure and I'm sure you do as well. I want to take a real quick break to hear from one of our great sponsors, 101 car chat, but we'll be right back with more. We'll Suggested correct.

<span;>What doesn't one of one car chop do from box case and personal breaks? There's always fire, being pulled. They offer both grading subs and their large store located in Strongsville. Ohio offers an incredible selection of sports cards non-sports and authentic autograph. Memorabilia. Stephen family will treat you right. Check them out on Instagram at one of one card shop or on the web at one of one carne shop.com. Sports coordination is back with Jesse. Craig. You came from the, the financial, the real estate, sort of things. It back into the hobby. Not unfamiliar territory people. In today's hobby, like to compare the the hobby, the sports card hobby to other markets, you know, whether it be Wall Street, real estate, your name this sort of Niche did it is always that sort of parallel as someone who's worked in both. Sectors, I mean, do you draw any comparisons to either or? Yeah, totally. I mean, first of all, it's kind of your standard economics and supply and demand, you know, same thing with housing, same thing with cards, you know, a lot of the skills. I learned in the housing market, translated to really help me more on a private sale perspective. You know, we've had some very noteworthy Private Sales and some record-breaking Private Sales. I think that you know how to handle those relationships and the The negotiations. Just like with real estate that really came into play when doing a lot of those behind the scenes private deals. So, but yeah, I would say that the Trading Card Market is closer to. I would say your traditional stocks and those kind of things more than housing. But there are, there are corollaries for sure. One little bit of the segue to has what happened affected you in a negative fashion.

<span;>You know, even though you're doing a very well as a company, like you said, some record-breaking auctions, no doubt mean sort of the Fallout or some of these, these allegations, and past things that, you know, with their company's name and Italy has that been? I mean, is there something you, you know, visible or something? You can you know quantitate to that at all. Yeah, I think any time you have negative press That comes out, you know, doesn't it doesn't your company any good. So you feel in one way or another. I do believe that people who have done business with us for a long time. They really know how we operate. You know, they understand what's probably true in was probably not. And so we have a very good following. We have a really good core with us, you know, in the eBay news, drop recently. We had competitors kind of sending out emails, going after Vault items for a lot of our users and we saw very, very, very

<span;>Leave. Our vault is, you know, the total value of our vault is higher than what it was when they even news dropped. Just A month ago. So I think that shows you that, you know, a lot of our clients are loyal and you know, they know that we're not going to do anything to jeopardize that. So we we have, we have been affected but we're more excited now than ever for where we're going to be. It's funny you mention that Jesse. I remember like did like you said the day after that statement for me baby some of the other big players if you will trying to tell, you know smell a little blood in the water to using an energy, you know. I think it just, you know, let's it shows you a little bit of the Cutthroat in the hobby as well. It is a business, whether people like that or not. I always say, you know, you may not do it for that reason and that's, that's fine. You know, but it is, I mean, we're seeing these deals will talk a little bit, maybe on the Fanatics side of recent events, but to to, to say that, you know, the sports card, have the industry is it?

<span;>You know, big business here, you're fooling yourself and it is now we don't have to whoever's / taken in a joint how he doesn't have to do it for that reason, but to the say otherwise is not being truthful about it. So, you know, you mentioned like you said, you had let eBay know. Hey, we're going to be launching our own platform here. You said they were fine with it. You think there's any you think? Assuming these allegations are false. As you said, you think there was any sour grapes, maybe on their part, maybe that's affected to the statement at all. I have my maybe I mean, yeah, I look like I said, it's speculation. So, you know, maybe they saw the writing on the wall that the premier auction had been very successful and, you know, we all know that eBay is not a great platform to sell items over. Maybe like 25 or 50 k, and because you don't, you can't get extended bidding. You can't have those kind of things. And that was our argument to them when we were building the platform.

<span;>Almost like a, we need an Avenue to give extended bidding to our higher-end clients because we're losing assets because of that. And that's when they allowed us to create our own platform. So I shouldn't say allowed us, you know, they we ran it by the most more of a ask for forgiveness, not permission kind of thing. It worked out great. And you know, the promotion was very successful. So like I said, maybe they saw the writing on the wall that we could do the same thing with lower and items and create a new platform, you know. What a lot of people don't realize to Hazard rates with eBay, were unbeliever better than anybody in on eBay. And so eBay's Revenue off of us was probably a lot less than people think it is. So it might not be have been as much of a financial hit for them to cut the ties with us. And you know, I've seen them come out with some new Trading Card platform things on eBay recently. And you know, they wanted to partner with us on there, on our vault and we actually backed out of that partnership because we

<span;>Feel like what they want to do a line with what we wanted to do. So, you know, it's just it's one of those things where you don't know if it was competition because we haven't gotten any information. So we're just kind of left to speculate. Yeah, talk about. So now, you know, you've got your own platform where you can do kind of different things than you're not relegated to someone above you like, you know, delegating or telling you, this is how it's going to be talking about the difficulties of launching and that's a That's quite a, an Endeavor God about the difficulties and even know what successful people thinking, you know, maybe people don't realize maybe the work and effort that goes into the it's a lot of work. You know, we have an 11 person Dev team. So those guys, you know, they they work day and night, you know, when we built the premier auction, that was that was slower over time. Obviously wants eBay, cut the cord last month, you know.

<span;>Our forces are building immediately and, you know, with with the dev team we have, luckily we're able to put our fixed price Marketplace back up within two weeks. So that was that was live on our website. We've had over 3 million in sales in just a few weeks on there, which is almost similar to what we were doing on eBay. It's about 70 75 % of what we're doing on eBay. So I think it just goes to show as well, that we've captured a lot of the captive, you know, buyers and sellers on eBay over the years, right? Like there are two users of ours and so, but the big missing piece is that Monthly auction that monthly auction is not an easy thing to replicate, you know, selling 35,000 cards a month. Is what we were doing on eBay in our October one that's launching is over 40,000. So that software is unique. It's going to be a little bit different. You know, we're launching it on. The seventh is the launch date for our new auction and it's actually a patent-pending the software. So we have what we believe is the only real way to close that much quantity in a short amount of time because we're going to be closing the auction over five total nights. EBay used to be 15 or so, but we're going to do all the baseball in one night now all the basketball in one n</span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;></span;>